| | WHAT A GRACELESS MESS...Do you not find it amazing that so many struggle so hard with so entrenched stereotypes of God? Why so insistent on seeing Him angry? Why so convinced He is exclusively vengeful? Why so desparately commited to punishment? Why so provacative the view He is out to get me? I watch and listen in awe as we cling to so vehemently established views emphasized by the hypercritical, condemnatory attitudes of some from mine own heritage. I have heard those same people say, "Why, brother, you are just too focused on grace," or, "All you talk about is grace," even, "I never hear about sin anymore." My heavens, I think, hear, live, breath, eat sin every moment of my waking life! The enemy painfully reminds me daily of my short-comings and spiritual bankruptcy! The Holy Spirit lovingly reminds me daily of His standards. I don't need help remembering, I need help forgetting:
...forgetting that I am not defined by the crap the enemy emblazons on my chest,
...forgetting Jesus is not as interested in my failing as in my presence,
...forgetting I do not have to be afraid of God anymore,
...forgetting to forget (hmmmm, who else does that? --Isaiah 43:25) Even musical Christian heritage leaves us reeling under the concussion of this dirty bomb:
"The all seeing eye is watching you..."
"...Would He devote that sacred head for such a worm as I?" I am grateful for much in my heritage: music, Bible training, and holy living; but, I have changed in grace (hence, the name of my site). I am not grateful for the punitive spirit of condemnation to which I was exposed, and implicitly blessed, by leadership. I am not grateful for learning to feel, "I am lower than the breast of the proverbial sperm whale which drags the bottom of the deepest, darkest ocean." I am now commited to making a difference in people's perceptions. Re-perceive my friends. And, lighten up. Otherwise, you may hear someone say... What a graceless mess. |
